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Washington Irving Quotes

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Famous Washington Irving Quotes

“How we delight to build our recollections upon some basis of reality,--a place, a country, a local habitation! how the events of life, as we look back upon them, have grown into the well-remembered background of the places where they fell upon us! Here is some sunny garden or summer lane, beautified and canonized forever, with the flood of a great joy; and here are dim and silent places,--rooms always shadowed and dark to us, whatever they may be to others,--where distress or death came once, and since then dwells forevermore.”

WellsLooksMayCountryRealityJoyDarkRoomsForeverEventsSummerGardenBasesSilentDelightBackgroundsLocalsRememberedAssociationFloodDistressSunnyLanesRecollectionGreat Joy
Author:Washington Irving
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“Nature seems to delight in disappointing the assuduities of art, with which it would rear dulness to maturity, and to glory in the vigor and luxuriance of her chance productions. She scatters the seeds of genius to the winds, and though some may perish among the stony places of the world, and some may be choked by the thorns and brambles of early adversity, yet others will now and then strike root even in the clefts of the rock, struggle bravely up into sunshine, and spread over their sterile birthplace all the beauties of vegetation.”

WorldMayArtSeemsChanceStruggleRocksWindGeniusGloryRootsAdversityProductionsDelightSpreadSeedsStrikesMaturitySunshineNow And ThenThornsDisappointingVigorVegetationBirthplace
Author:Washington Irving
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“I was always fond of visiting new scenes, and observing strange characters and manners. Even when a mere child I began my travels, and made many tours of discovery into foreign parts and unknown regions of my native city, to the frequent alarm of my parents, and the emolument of the town-crier.”

ChildrenMadeBookCharacterParentCitiesStrangeSceneDiscoveryTownsMereMannersNativeRegionsObservingAlarmsVisiting
Book:History of New York. Sketch book. Bracebridge Hall
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“When the Gauls laid waste Rome, they found the senators clothed in their robes, and seated in stern tranquillity in their curule chairs; in this manner they suffered death without resistance or supplication. Such conduct was in them applauded as noble and magnanimous; in the hapless Indians it was reviled as both obstinate and sullen. How truly are we the dupes of show and circumstances! How different is virtue, clothed in purple and enthroned in state, from virtue, naked and destitute, and perishing obscurely in a wilderness.”

DifferentStatesShowsFoundVirtueCircumstancesWasteNobleResistanceNakedChairsWildernessRomeSenatorsPurpleRobesObstinateTranquillityDestituteSullenSupplicationDupesPerishingMagnanimous
Book:History, Tales, and Sketches
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“Critics are a kind of freebooters in the republic of letters--who, like deer, goats and divers other graminivorous animals, gain subsistence by gorging upon buds and leaves of the young shrubs of the forest, thereby robbing them of their verdure, and retarding their progress to maturity.”

KindYoungAnimalProgressGainsLettersCriticsForestsMaturityRepublicBudGoatsDeerRobbingSubsistenceShrubs
Book:The Complete Works: With a Memoir of the Author
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“It is the divine attribute of the imagination, that it is irrepressible, unconfinable; that when the real world is shut out, it can create a world for itself, and with a necromantic power can conjure up glorious shapes and forms, and brilliant visions to make solitude populous, and irradiate the gloom of a dungeon.”

WorldRealFormImaginationVisionDivineShapesSolitudeBrilliantGloriousReal WorldAttributesGloomDungeonsIrrepressible
Book:The Complete Short Stories of Washington Irving: The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Bracebridge Hall, Tales of a Traveler, The Alhambra, Woolfert’s Roost & The Crayon Papers Collections (Illustrated): The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Rip Van Winkle, Old Christmas, The Voyage, Roscoe, The Widow’s Retinue, An Old Soldier, Mountjoy, Don Juan, Woolfert’s Roost, Tales of The Alhambra and many more
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“A father may turn his back on his child, brothers and sisters may become inveterate enemies, husbands may desert their wives, wives their husbands. But a mother's love endures through all; in good repute, in bad repute, in the face of the world's condemnation, a mother still loves on, and still hopes that her child may turn from his evil ways, and repent; still she remembers the infant smiles that once filled her bosom with rapture, the merry laugh, the joyful shout of his childhood, the opening promise of his youth; and she can never be brought to think him all unworthy.”

ThinkingWorldWayMayChildrenStillsRememberFacesMotherTurnsEvilFatherEnemyLaughingWifeChildhoodYouthBrotherPromiseHusbandFilledEndureOpeningDesertJoyfulBrothers And SistersInfantRepentBosomsMerryUnworthyRaptureCondemnationMother's Love
Author:Washington Irving
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“He who thinks much says but little in proportion to his thoughts. He selects that language which will convey his ideas in the most explicit and direct manner. He tries to compress as much thought as possible into a few words. On the contrary, the man who talks everlastingly and promiscuously, who seems to have an exhaustless magazine of sound, crowds so many words into his thoughts that he always obscures, and very frequently conceals them.”

ThinkingMenTryingLittlesIdeasSeemsLanguageSoundStyleHe ManDirectCrowdsContraryMagazinesProportionExplicitFew Words
Author:Washington Irving
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“Nothing can be more touching than to behold a soft and tender female, who had been all weakness and dependence, and alive to every trivial roughness while treading the prosperous paths of life, suddenly rising in mental force to be the comforter and supporter of her husband under misfortune, and abiding with unshrinking firmness the bitterest blast of adversity.”

ForcePathAliveWifeHusbandWeaknessFemaleAdversityRisingMisfortunesTouchingDependenceSupporterProsperousAbidingBlastFirmnessTreadingComforterRoughness
Book:The Complete Works: With a Memoir of the Author
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“Sometimes the table was graced with immense apple-pies, or saucers full of preserved peaches and pears; but it was always sure to boast an enormous dish of balls of sweetened dough, fried in hog's fat, and called doughnuts, or olykoeks - a delicious kind of cake, at present scarce known in this city, except in genuine Dutch families.”

KindSometimesCitiesKnownFoodBallsTablesCookingGenuineEnormousFatsApplesCulinaryCakeImmenseDishesPieDeliciousBoastScarceDutchPeachesHogDoughDoughnutPearsApple Pie
Book:The works
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“The dullest observer must be sensible of the order and serenity prevalent in those households where the occasional exercise of a beautiful form of worship in the morning gives, as it were, the keynote to every temper for the day, and attunes every spirit to harmony.”

GivingBeautifulFormSpiritOrderMorningExerciseWorshipHarmonyTemperSensibleHouseholdSerenityObserversOccasional
Book:The Complete Works of Washington Irving: Short Stories, Plays, Historical Works, Poetry and Autobiographical Writings (Illustrated): The Entire Opus of the Prolific American Writer, Biographer and Historian, Including The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Rip Van Winkle, The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Bracebridge Hall and many more
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“To one given to day-dreaming, and fond of losing himself in reveries, a sea-voyage is full of subjects for meditation; but then they are the wonders of the deep and of the air, and rather tend to abstract the mind from worldly themes.”

MindDreamGivenWonderMeditationAirSeaSubjectsLosingAbstractThemeWorldlyVoyagesReverieSea Voyage
Book:The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. – The Complete Collection: The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, Rip Van Winkle, The Voyage, Roscoe, A Royal Poet, A Sunday in London and many more (Illustrated)
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“Her mighty lakes, like oceans of liquid silver; her mountains with their right aerial tints; her valleys, teeming with wild fertility; her tremendous cataracts, thundering in their solitudes; her boundless plains, waving with spontaneous verdure; her brought deep rivers, rolling in solemn silence to the ocean; her trackless forests, where vegetation puts forth all its magnificence; her skies, kindling waves in the magic of the summer clouds and glorious sunshine;-no, never need an American look beyond his own country for the sublime and beautiful of natural scenery.”

NeedsLooksCountryBeautifulNaturalSilenceMagicSkySolitudeMountainOceanSummerRiversCloudsWaveForestsGloriousLakesSilverSunshineValleysRollingSpontaneousSublimeSolemnLiquidBoundlessSceneryFertilityMagnificenceVegetationKindlingNatural Scenery
Author:Washington Irving
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“There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are the messengers of overwhelming grief, of deep contrition, and of unspeakable love.”

LoveDeathSpeakGriefMarriageTearsThousandTenWeaknessMarkTongueGrievingMourningBroken HeartRepentanceGrief And LossOverwhelmingSympathyBereavementMournMessengersUnspeakableGrief And HealingCondolencesSacrednessLove And LossGriefingGrief LossDeath GriefGrief And DeathThose GrievingDeath ComfortGrief And MourningGrieving A DeathLoss Loved One InspirationalDeath And GrievingGrief ComfortGrief HealingStages Of GriefGrief And HopeContritionInspirational GriefInspirational MourningSadness And SorrowDeath GrievingComforting DeathGrieving And HealingComfort The GrievingGrieving PoemsInspirational BereavementComfort LossFamous CondolenceTears And CryingDeath And MourningGrieving InspirationalInspirational GrievingDeath MourningHealing From LossDeep SorrowRecovering From GriefMourning DeathDeep GriefTears Of Sorrow
Author:Washington Irving
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“Love is never lost. If not reciprocated, it will flow back and soften and purify the heart.”

IfsLoveHeartLostLove IsBrokenMy HeartHeartbreakFlowMoving ForwardBreakupBroken HeartInspirational LoveLost LoveUnrequited LoveHeartbrokenBreak UpUnrequitedHeart BreakSad LoveHeart BrokeBreaking My HeartBroke My HeartLost YouHeart BreakingHearts And LoveBeing BrokenMy Heart Is BrokenFeeling LostBroken LoveReciprocateLoved And LostLove And Broken HeartSad Breaking HeartAfter BreakupHeart Breaking LoveAfter Break UpRelationships EndingSad Heart BreakBreaking Heart In LoveLove And LostBreakups And Moving OnBroken Heart LoveLost In ThoughtLove Is LostLove And HeartbreakMoving On After BreakupSad Break Up LoveReally Sad Break UpHeart Break UpSad Broken HeartBurning HeartLost HeartWeary HeartLost Years
Author:Washington Irving
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